The following background information may present examples of specific aspects of the prior art (e.g., without limitation, approaches, facts, or common wisdom) that, while expected to be helpful to further educate the reader as to additional aspects of the prior art, is not to be construed as limiting the present invention, or any embodiments thereof, to anything stated or implied therein or inferred thereupon.
Typically, a golf cart is a small motorized vehicle for carrying golfers and their equipment across a golf course. Golf carts commonly have a seating cabin covered by a roof and an uncovered rear deck or compartment. This rear compartment is used to hold a golf bag and clubs, a sweater basket, as well as other gear, during use of the cart. Golfers within the covered cabin may be protected during rain; but the golf clubs remain exposed to the elements, and thereby get wet and slippery.
Often, golf carts install a rear compartment canopy to protect the rear compartment and its contents. The canopy can be easily opened as needed to access the contents carried in the rear compartment and closed when the cart is not in use. It is known in the art to have canopies for golf cart rear compartments. Generally, it advantageous for the canopy to unfold over and in close proximity to the clubs to minimize exposure to the weather. The canopy is often a portable, removable rear cover having a resilient cover that drapes over hingedly rotatable, or sliding supporting brackets.
In many instances, the canopy can be moved between a deployed position and an undeployed position. Currently available canopies are releasably secured in the non-operative, undeployed, condition by means of a hook and loop-type fasteners including a loop bundle strip attached at one end to the back section of the cover section and a hook bundle strip fixedly secured atop an attachment member. Snaps are also used to secure the canopies when undeployed.
Typically, when the canopy is undeployed it is folded-up upon itself so that the roof-like and the rear parts of the canopy drape between their supporting brackets while each of the side panels of the canopy is limp and folded upon itself. The folds of the panels tend to collect moisture, dust, bugs, and general debris that enter the folds from the open parts at the top and also from the sides.
Other proposals have involved covering the open rear compartment of a golf cart with a canopy structure. The problem with these golf cart canopies is that the panels fold into themselves, which provides a crevice for moisture, debris, and bugs to enter. Also, the panels cannot be retained in a folded away position to clear the rear line of sight, or cover the rear open area more effectively. Even though the above cited golf cart canopies meet some of the needs of the market, an open-air car canopy and cover assembly providing a rearwardly extending canopy that provides an upper pocket for encapsulating the rotatable supporting bracket and the panels in the undeployed position; lateral and rear flaps having fastening members to retain the panels out of the rear sight line and the side openings of the open-air car; a roof mount that detachably attaches the canopy to the roof of the open-air car through use of a curved flange that hooks over a roof support structure, and metallic tensioned hooks that hook under the roof support structure; and a tensioned hinge member that is operable with the rotatable supporting bracket to retain the canopy in a fixed position at or between the deployed and undeployed positions, is still desired.